web2awards Profile: Fineline Printing
By Printing Industries of America staff
Since Richard Miller opened it thirty years ago, Fineline Printing of Indianapolis, IN has grown to fill a 56,000 square foot facility with over 60 employees and the latest printing equipment. Today Fineline offers a variety of services including print-on-demand, online ordering, digital asset management, variable-data printing, large-format printing, and fulfillment. They also serve a variety of markets including nonprofits, colleges and universities, hospitals and clinics, financial and insurance businesses, manufacturers, sororities and fraternities, and associations.
Since Fineline won an award for best in category in the 2011 web2awards, we asked them a few questions about the importance of their website to the growth of their business.
What role does your website play in your business?
Our website has many roles. It informs prospective customers and employees about what we do and what makes us different. It provides a channel to get information from us, to funnel quotation requests, and submit files via our FTP. It also allows us to rank high on search engines, when people search terms that relate to what Fineline does. It allows us to showcase job openings and solicit resumes. It informs the media and other community organizations about what we do and how we give back.
What resources or content are available on your website?
There are many resources on our site. We have information (both web pages and PDFs) on all of our products and services; an online promotional and apparel store; links to outside resources like postal services and forms; our equipment list; file preparation guidelines; news releases; e-newsletter archives; digital versions of our magazine and its archives; customer testimonials; a customer feedback portal; all of our current certifications that showcase our MBE, quality, and green qualifications; job postings; and some of our core policies.
How do you gauge your website’s effectiveness?
We base the effectiveness of our website on the volume and resulting success of quote requests and other inquires; visit volume, visit length, etc.; and feedback from our employees, customers, and prospective employees.
To visit Fineline Printing on the web, go to http://finelink.com.
web2awards Profile: Freeport Press
By Printing Industries of America staff
A nationally recognized commercial printing company, Freeport Press has been in continuous operation at their Freeport, Ohio facility since 1880. A family-owned and -operated company, Freeport Press has experienced double-digit growth over the past twelve years and in the past two years they’ve installed two brand-new Komori web press systems and added 250 new publishers to their list of customers.
Along with offset printing, Freeport Press offers a variety of other services, including finishing options; comprehensive distribution services like list management, co-mailing, and drop-shipping; an online ad portal; complimentary issue-mapping software; and a digital magazine solution.
As a winner in the 2011 web2awards the Freeport Press website, http://www.freeportpress.com/, greatly impressed our judges. With a clean, inviting design, the Freeport Press website clearly communicates the company’s vision while still conveying a lot of information and sharing a significant amount of content. The company also maintains a strong presence on various social media channels and has integrated their site with their Flickr and YouTube accounts.
We recently spoke with David Pilcher, VP of Sales and Marketing at Freeport Press about the development of the website and it’s importance to the company.
What role does your website play in your business?
Our website is part of our media that provides an initial impression to our prospects. We believe it to be an integral component of our marketing efforts that serves an essential function of capturing prospects’ interest while providing them with valuable information and resources.
What resources or content are available on your website?
We have a tab at the top of every page entitled “Resources” that explains how to access our prepress department 24 hours a day, 5 days a week. We also share a variety of guides for embedding links into PDF documents for digital editions, including Equipment List Guide, File Naming Guide, File Requirements, and Furnished Paper Guide.
In regards to content, we highlight various aspects of our company using standard web pages to which people have become accustomed, including a company page, history page, and president’s letter. Furthermore, we include copies of all press releases on our site and share interactive information, such as more dynamic content, like a digital edition of our company newsletter and a video page featuring our company as well as publishing and magazines in general.
How do you gauge your website’s effectiveness?
We consistently earn high marks for our website thanks to its ease of navigation and the look and feel of the site, which are very much in line with our marketing materials. A website needs to communicate information in an interesting way, presenting it clearly and quickly. The website needs to leave a great impression on visitors, which is always our goal.
web2awards Profile: Mimeo.com
By Printing Industries of America staff
The web2awards were established in 2009 by Printing Industries of America to recognize, honor, and elevate standards for websites that are print-centric. Over the last three years, our judges have evaluated a number of print-centric websites that fall into many different categories. Mimeo.com, an innovative provider of online, on-demand document printing and distribution, has won the Best in Show category in the web2awards for three years running.
Founded in 1998 as a technology company that prints, Mimeo.com’s success started with the deployment of a cloud based model. Today, the company operates over 200,000 square feet of digital print capacity, across three strategically located facilities. They've been named one of the fastest growing private companies in North America five years in a row by Inc. Magazine. The future for Mimeo.com looks even brighter with new partnerships, accelerating levels of customer growth, the planned roll out of new technologies, and European expansion.
We recently spoke with Chuck Gehman, Vice President of Product Platforms at Mimeo.com, and asked him a few questions about the development of his company’s website.
What role does your website play in your business?
The websites play a critical role. Not only are all of our orders placed via the websites, but they also deliver print and production ready documents into our workflow, which allows us to operate our automated factories.
Who are the customers for the e-commerce section of your website? (general public, customers with private portals, etc.)
A lot of people think online printing company means “no sales reps” and that customers just find our website, register, and start sending us orders. It is true that we get a certain amount of “walk-up” traffic, where people find us by searching the Internet and figure out how to build documents and place orders by themselves. More often our sales people find a customer with volumes of work that is appropriate for the products we manufacture, and they convince them to do business with us. These customers are often in corporate America and frequently members of the Fortune 1000, companies with “household names.” We also serve a lot of small to medium sized businesses. In fact, a lot of consultants, trainers, event planners, and the like, gravitate toward us because of our very fast turnaround times and great quality and customer service.
How was the engine that drives your web-to-print solution developed?
We started out during the "dotcom" era as a “Click and Mortar” company. We were founded in 1998 when David Uyttendaele, our CTO, went out and bought a Xerox DocuTech, built a website, and connected the two together! A year later, we opened our first (and still our flagship) Automated Document Factory in Memphis, TN. We have been developing and enhancing the website since then. We employ a large number of software developers in New York City and Memphis.
VDP Costing and Pricing: The Fundamentals
By Joe Marin, Senior Analyst, Digital Technologies, Printing Industries of America
Generally speaking, static printing—offset or digital—has become more and more of a commodity. Are you looking for some proof? All you have to do is Google “business card printer” and look at the search results. The ability for printers to turn a profit with most static work is mostly based on machine speed (how many sheets of paper can that device print) and operator efficiency (how quickly can the operator finish one job and begin another). This is the way of the static print service provider—become more efficient and lower prices to be more competitive. Following this vicious cycle, the static printer eventually hits the proverbial “wall” where prices can longer be lowered.
The opportunities to increase profits for printers lie with variable-data printing (VDP). One of the keys to profitability is understanding the difference between estimating and pricing static printing versus VDP. As mentioned previously, offset (or any type of static printing) is a commodity and is typically sold as cost per copy. VDP, however, is a solution. It’s the value of this solution that has to be figured into the cost of the job.
In a new white paper for the DPC, author Joe Marin explains the fundamental aspects of VDP costing and pricing. All Printing Industries of America members can download this white paper here: VDP Costing and Pricing: The Fundamentals.
Social Media and Direct Mail
By Ryan Sauers, Sauers Consulting Strategies
The following article, with a few updates, originally appeared on the blog of Sauers Consulting Strategies Owner/CEO Ryan Sauers (http://www.ryansauersblog.com/). Ryan will be speaking at the 2011 Integrated Print Forum and he is also authoring a book, Everyone’s in Sales, which will be published at the end of year. Currently, you can pre-order the book at a discounted rate (mention code IPF2011) at http://www.everyoneinsales.com or http://www.sauersconsulting.com. You can also email Ryan at ryansauers@sauersconsulting.com.
I commonly say that social media marketing is a tool not the tool in one's overall communications tool kit. Moreover, some of the traditional printing and mailing industry dislike social media—as some feel it has taken away from the importance of printing/direct mail. This argument is not true—because social media, if done well, simply enhances printing and mailing and integrates these functions into an organizations’ overall strategy.
So, while it is true printing has changed it has not “died.” On the other hand, many people who are “experts” in social media look at printing and direct mail as an “old school” way of communicating and an unnecessary marketing activity. Many suggest social media will cure all of your marketing woes; however, they have not looked at the recent trends in direct mail being a welcome change of pace to our online-“all-the-time” world. Simply said, printing it is still really effective. New research backs up this claim.
My argument is that both tools are important. One cannot overlook the benefits of direct mail or social media without considering how they tie together. Neither of these tools are free—as they both take time and money. Many people fail to realize that social media is not “free.” It is free to use, yes, but someone has to handle all of the information and oversee the campaign. Unless they are a really nice volunteer (and if you are such a person contact me), someone is being paid to use/oversee these tools and campaigns.
My suggestion is for you to determine where your audience is and then decide the best ways to connect with them based on their preferences. We can help you. Our expertise is in helping printing related businesses. We (break down sales and marketing silos) and integrate these areas to work together and ensure they are in alignment with the overall executive strategy-- so more profitable sales can occur. So, be in consistent in all that you do and be integrated in your communications strategy (online and offline) so you can continue to grow. By doing this, you will provide valuable information to clients, in the way they want to receive it, and be seen as a thought leader. www.sauersconsulting.com
QR Codes: Mobile Trends Driving Use
By Joe Marin, Senior Analyst, Digital Technologies, Printing Industries of America
Note: This article first appeared on www.integratedprintforum.org, the website for Printing Industries of America's Integrated Print Forum.
The us of QR codes is mainstream in Japan, growing in Europe, and gaining traction in the U.S. The key to success is that they take advantage of the exploding popularity of a device that many of us always have close by--our smartphones. According to Nielsen, 17% of the U.S. population own a smartphone--a phone that contains(at the very least) a camera and a browser to access the Internet. A few other compelling statistics supporting the popularity of smartphones use are:
- The number of times we access the Internet daily from our smartphones has almost doubled in the last year (Source: Pew Research Center's Internet and America Life Project 2010 Tracking Survey).
- 20% of all consumers used their phones to browse and research products (Source: ATG Cross-Channel Commerce: The Consumer View).
- 37% of U.S. smartphone users have made a purchase on their phones in the last six months (Source: Compete, Inc.).
- Mobile commerce tripled in the U.S. in 2009 to $1.2 billion (Source: ABI Research).
- In 2015, $119 billion goods and services will be purchased via mobile phone (Source: ABI Research).
- eBay m-commerce in 2010 was $2 billion, up from $600 million in 2009
